1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a network-based education system that allows an instructor to give a lecture to a plurality of students via a computer network, and also to a computer-readable medium encoded with an instructor-side computer program and/or student-side computer program for implementing a network-based education system. More particularly, the present invention relates to a network-based education system that delivers an instructional course to a plurality of students in a simultaneous fashion, and to a computer-readable medium encoded with an instructor-side computer program and/or student-side computer program for implementing such a network-based education system.
2. Description of the Related Art
The advancement of computer network technologies has made it possible to deliver educational services to different locations at the same time via computer networks. Systems developed for this purpose are called distance learning systems or network-based education systems. A system described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Publication No. 8-227266 (1996) is one of such network-based education systems proposed today.
This proposed education system has a database that is constructed beforehand for management of profile information of individual students, including their study items, grades they got in each instructional unit, study progress status, educational careers, and other records. When a student logs in to the education system through a computer network, the system presents appropriate instructional contents for him/her according to the profile information retrieved from the database. The student can request the instructor, at any point of the session, to change the skill level and/or to give other explanations related to the subject. At the end of every instructional unit, the students are graded according to their individual achievements. If some students failed to get an average or higher grade, they will be offered an opportunity to take an interactive counseling service from the instructor, where they will talk about the degree of difficulty concerning the classes and discuss the way to improve the instruction for better understanding.
While the above-described distance education system virtually provides an instructional course to a plurality of students, the class actually proceeds not simultaneously but on an individual student basis. It is therefore impossible for an instructor to check the students' understanding levels at his/her discretion or to take an appropriate support for the students according to their respective understanding levels. In order to compensate for such deficiency, the above education system employs a variety of analyzing functions based on educational psychology to investigate the type of study suitable for individual students and to check carefully the progress of their study. These functions, however, impose heavy data processing loads as well as requesting a large storage capacity to the system. Also, students should interact with the computer, but the system's operability and capability to support individual students are rather limited.
Meanwhile, there are some other systems designed to instruct a plurality of remote students in a simultaneous fashion. Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Publications No. 3-146986 (1991) and No. 4-082488 (1992), for example, disclose network-based education systems of this kind.
In the former system (No. 3-146986), the instructor can see, on his/her monitor screen, the view of his/her students captured by a video camera situated in a distant classroom. When one of the remote students pressed a request switch in an attempt to speak something, the system will automatically bring the focus of the camera on the requesting student, thereby enabling the instructor to take a closer look at the student. This feature helps the participants to talk to each other with the sense of affinity.
In the latter system (No. 4-082488), when a remote student pushed a request switch in an attempt to ask a question, the system automatically delivers the close-up image of the requesting student not only to the instructor terminal but also to other monitors located in different classrooms, thereby allowing other students to participate in the discussion.
The above-described two systems propose the effective use of camera views so that the instructor and students in separate locations may feel an affinity for each other. In those conventional systems, however, it is not easy for the instructor to arbitrarily check the students' understanding levels at his/her discretion, or to give a particular instructional action to the students and watch their responses thereto, which may be possible in an ordinary face-to-face environment where all participants are in the same classroom. It is particularly difficult for the instructor to provide individual students with appropriate material for review purposes that meet their respective understanding levels.